PROVENANCE: Polizzo Collection, Paris; Robert Lehman, New York; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lehman to BJU, 1957.

The Bicci family in Gothic Florence formed a lineage of artistic production, beginning with Lorenzo di Bicci and continuing with his son Bicci di Lorenzo, and his grandson Neri di Bicci. The Bicci family operated the most important workshop of the day, possibly giving instruction to the Father of Renaissance art, Masaccio. Interestingly, Bicci's present Sant'Anna is based on Masaccio's monumental image of the Sant'Anna Metterza in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. However, Bicci's composition betrays an adherence to an older style in spite of the stylistic revolution created in the 1420s by Masaccio and Masolino. Bicci's approach changed only slightly with current Gothic trends, such as the International Style introduced in Florence by Gentile da Fabriano. However, his traditionally conservative Gothic style met the demand that the majority of churches wanted for their sanctuaries.

Information about Saint Anne, the mother of Mary, comes from apocryphal sources of the second and third centuries. She became a popular subject after the city of Florence banished the oppressive Duke of Athens in 1343 on July 26, St. Anne's feast day, and attributed the victory to her. For decades afterwards the Florentines honored her by placing her third ( messa terza in Italian) in the hierarchy of the Holy Family pictures, such as in the present Sant'Anna Metterza. Although the original location for this image is unknown, it was probably painted for a Florentine church where St. Anne was revered as a patron saint of that city. The composition forms a wonderful series of pyramids, with St. Anne forming the outer, Mary the middle, and Mary's arm and Christ's bent pose forming the inner. The panel can still be viewed in its original 15th-century Florentine frame.